All the Right Stuff by Walter Dean Myers
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Paul DuPree is a teen who has lost his hardly present dad to a shooting that is commonplace in Harlem. Working in a soup kitchen just to get by, he is forced to listen to the soup man, Elijah talk about “the social contract” and how to feel good in a world that isn’t fair for everyone. A gripping, extraordinary Myers book will save lives with Paul’s learned lessons.
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Zom-B by Darren Shan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
B is a teen living in England with a racist, abusive father who drinks too much and beats B and her mother on a daily basis. Weird thing is, B loves her father and hates him at the same time for his despicable bias. She has molded her personality to be able to deal with her father, love him and hate him while also becoming a teen who is a trouble-maker, fighter, and racist herself. When zombies attack, B and her friends are racing to get out of the school and stay alive and B quickly becomes a leader. With spare black and white illustrations, Shen’s first zombie book will have your heart racing til the next book arrives.
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Bomb: The Race to Build—and Steal—the World's Most Dangerous Weapon by Steve Sheinkin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Beginning with the spy Harry Gold and expanding out to Germany, Great Britain, Norway, the Soviets and U.S. secret location of Los Almos, Bomb is a wild ride as the race to build the first atomic bomb is waged. Sheinkin provides interesting, exciting, detailed research, primary sources, photographs, and delivers a riveting heart pounding, page turner. This nonfiction title about the creation of the hydrogen bomb, has so many important characters that bear mentioning: Robert Oppenheimer, Tony Hall, Leslie Groves, Norwegian Knut Haukelid, and President Truman. Bomb has aptly earned its award as 2012 National Book Awards finalist for Young People’s Literature.
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I Hunt Killers by Barry Lyga
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Wow, what a heart-stopping thriller; imagine you are the son of a serial killer who has claimed 124 victims before being jailed. Jasper Dent’s father, Billy, made sure he schooled his son from a very young age in his evil inclinations. But the reader sees Jasper as a truly likable hero who is tortured by what his father did only wants to help law enforcement when it looks like serial killer is on the loose mimicking his father’s first victims. A true YA psychological thriller that is very, very disturbing, but oh so good.
Serial Killers, Fiction
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Call the Shots by Don Calame
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
In this third humorous boy book, the hilarious trio of Cooper, Matt and Sean have come up with another wacky idea to gain notoriety with girls (they think) of producing a scary movie to win the prize money and help Sean who has to give up his bedroom since his mother is pregnant. Worse than living with his twin sister is listening to her call him gay, which he is not; he is just sensitive and a little bit weird. Calame is at his best with characters like Uncle Doug, Nessa, crazy Nick and Evelyn. Crude, lots of boy humour (sexual) and lots of laughs.
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Beat the Band by Don Calame
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
In the 2nd book, Cooper and his friends decide to enter a contest to win a Band competition and the laughs continue as one thing after another goes wrong beginning with Coop's father and then spreading out to include Uncle Doug, Nick and so much more. Try it, you will love this book if you enjoy boy humor!
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Trafficked by Kim Purcell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Hannah is a seventeen year old from Moldova who has lost both her parents in a bombing. She is brought to the United States by an “agent” and believes she will make $400 per week watching children and going to school to learn English and finish her education. This book shows slowly but surely how Hannah learns the real truth behind her trip to the United States. She toils long days doing housework and watching Maggie and Michael while their mother studies to become a doctor. Her husband Sergey is involved in some kind of shady business. Hannah is not allowed outside, she must speak only Russian to the children and the family is not paying her. As Hannah remains isolated, she uses her inner grit and determination to survive this slave existence.
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Ripper by Stefan Petrucha
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Thanks Sally for reviewing this for me for PSLA 2013! Carver Young, Finn Walker and Delia Stephens are all orphans living at Ellis Orphanage in the 1800s when they learn the orphanage is closing. All three are adopted, Delia by a New York Times reporter and his wife, Finn by the District Attorney and his wife and Carver by Albert Hawking of the New Pinkerton Agency. Finn finds himself living in an insane asylum with his mentor searching for his father. The only information he has is a letter sent to the orphanage that throws Carver into the middle of mayhem. Jack the Ripper has surfaced in New York and is killing wealthy socialite women, and scaring all New Yorkers. The New Pinkerton Agency is trying to solve the crimes. Carver realizes the letter from his father looks an awful lot like the notes Jack the Ripper is sending to the police and New York Times; a suspenseful adventure begins involving Carver, Delia, and Finn.
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Master of Deceit: J. Edgar Hoover and America in the Age of Lies by Marc Aronson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Aronson’s portrait of J. Edgar Hoover during his 40 year reign as the head of the FBI was riveting and to quote the author, “scary.” I didn’t really know much about Hoover and I was sickened by his tactics. Hoover blackmailed “everyone” by keeping secret files; he poisoned his staff with his directives and took advantage of his position whenever he felt the inclination. There was meticulous period research but this did not read like a history book but a superb thriller you can’t put down. This period in US history was certainly tainted with the likes of J. Edgar Hoover and Joseph MacCarthy. As I rooted for those “few” who took on J. Edgar Hoover with right and might; I cried for the many like the Rosenbergs, the Scottsboro Boys and Martin Luther King. Illustrated and Includes bibliographical references (p. 198-219) and index. Highly recommended for high school students.
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The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Katherine Applegate’s book has been recommended to me by students and I see it is on the SLJ Best Books of 2012 and I so agree. Ivan is a Silverback gorilla who lives in a rundown mall at the end of Exit 8 where he is billed as the one and only, Ivan. Ivan has lived here his whole life and has a few friends in Stella, the elephant and Bob, the homeless dog. He has been raised by Mack, who owns this rag tag show and is not happy that profits are down. George cleans the stalls and his daughter Julia, does her homework and draws. When Stella falls ill and Mack brings in a baby elephant, Stella exacts a promise from Ivan that he will make sure Ruby has a safe place to spend her life. Ivan loves to draw and he is able to communicate to Julia through his pictures that Ruby needs to spend her life in a zoo. Based on a true story, Ivan and Ruby’s plight will pull at your heart. Animal lovers will enjoy this beautiful, brave book.
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The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
If you are looking for another seductively written book by Maggie Stiefvater, The Raven Boys, is it! I fell in love with Blue’s world of fortune tellers living in Henrietta, VA. Blue Sargent is a prickly strong female protagonist in this adventure into psychics (Blue’s family), the prep school world of Aglionby Academy (Blue hates these privileged boys, calling them the Raven Boys) and family (all the good and the bad). Blue is sixteen and has been told her whole life by her mother, she will kiss the boy she loves and he will die, and it is at an annual spirit hunt, she meets the ghost called Gansey. What a wonder that Gansey and his strange crew of Aglionby friends arrives at her home for a tarot reading. Gansey and his friends, Adam, Ronan, and Noah believe in the power of ley lines and have traversed the world in a frenzied belief that they can locate the Ancient Welsh King Glendower, raise him up and be granted a wish of unprecedented worth. I could not put this book down, I was sucked into Blue’s world as she becomes friends with these boys she grew up loathing; accompanying them on searches for ley lines and spirits. You learn about the boys, their behavior at school, their family dysfunctions and their total commitment to each other and it is these characters and their personalities (annoying and troubled) that keep the pages turning, especially the runes, séances, ghosts, all providing a thrilling, mesmerizing read. I can’t wait for the next book!
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The Diviners by Libba Bray
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Libba Bray’s The Diviners was thrilling to read; I did not want to rip myself away from the 1920s world Bray crafted of flappers, murder, mystery and an impending evil that is being felt by the diviners (those who have supernatural powers to see, feel and predict). Evie is seventeen, bored with her restricted family life but also aware she has powers, which she sometimes uses at parties to liven things up. This gets her into trouble and she is shipped off to live with her Uncle Will in NYC as a punishment. Uncle Will is a college professor who also owns the Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult. As soon as she reaches NY, Evie accompanies the police with her Uncle Will and his student, Jericho, to the scene of a murder and it is when she touches the dead girl’s shoe buckle that she sees the girl’s murderer. It is in this bustling NYC that we also meet many other characters with powers and pasts they want hidden; Theta, Memphis, Isaiah, Blind Bill and Miss Walker. What is particularly mesmerizing and unpleasant is evil of Naughty John Hobbes; as more are murdered Evie, her Uncle Will and Jericho try to unravel a mystery that involves ghosts, haunted houses, demons, and evil in 1920s New York. I can’t wait for the second book!
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